


The Bastard of the Bear and the Wolf Maid

by juliannakatharina



Category: A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin, Game of Thrones (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe, F/M, Infidelity, Marriage, One Night Stand, illegitimate child
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-11-14
Updated: 2015-11-14
Packaged: 2018-05-01 12:38:43
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,523
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5206181
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/juliannakatharina/pseuds/juliannakatharina
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>FYI: I believe in R+L=J. </p><p>I just wrote this on and posted it on tumblr for fun. Hope you enjoy it!</p>
    </blockquote>





	The Bastard of the Bear and the Wolf Maid

**Author's Note:**

> FYI: I believe in R+L=J. 
> 
> I just wrote this on and posted it on tumblr for fun. Hope you enjoy it!

Jorah Mormont was not classically handsome man. Some would venture to say he was unhandsome. However, one could not deny that he held a certain confidence that some men could only fathom. He had fought bravely in two rebellions, Robert’s Rebellion and the Greyjoy rebellion. The latter had earned him a knighthood he had dreamed of, since he was a young boy fascinated by tales of the south. Fate had sent him to Lannisport to join the lists in the tourney in honour of the King’s victory. Jorah had beheld the most beautiful woman in the world. She looked like the Maid herself. _A true goddess._ Jorah ran his hand through his prematurely balding head, before making his way to ask for the favour of this unearthly blonde beauty. If the Gods were good Jorah was certain this female perfection would be his lady wife and the mother of his sons.

“Lord Mormont! Oh I’m sorry, I came to congratulate you on your knighthood, ser.” The King’s lady sister touched his forearm gently and smiled up at him. The Lady Lyanna was considered a wild, northern beauty to many. Her hair was too dark, and curly. Her skin too pale. Her figure too thin, but his eyes skimmed to her reasonably endowed chest. Jorah had to admit she was beautiful in her own way if not to his own tastes. “My brother, the king, spoke of your bravery in the siege.”

“Thank you, my lady.” He smiled and dipped his head. Jorah glanced over at Lord Leyton Hightower’s beautiful daughter laughing merrily to the other ladies.

“Your brother, the king was gracious to honour me.”

“It’s been so long since I have been in the North,” remarked Lady Lyanna Stark wistfully. “I was wondering if you would-”

“Yes?” asked Jorah distractedly as he glanced over the head of golden blonde curls. “If you would wear my favour in the tourney? You see you are the only northman in the lists,” she explained holding a fabric of blue linen cloth with winter roses stitched on it. He had never had a highborn woman boldly come up to him before. However, Jorah hesitated for too long. “I see you had intended to ask someone else. I’m sorry, ser.” Lady Lyanna looked awkwardly away and let go of his forearm. Her smile died, her face was frozen as if she was carved from ice.

“My lady- I mean no offence. I thought you were betrothed to the late Lord Robert’s brother,” Jorah backtracked.

“Yes, I suppose I am,” Lady Lyanna agreed with deep bitterness. “I bid you luck in the tournament, ser.” She walked away and without a moment to ponder his exchange with Lady Lyanna. Jorah drew himself straight and mounted his horse, riding over to the young, beautiful Lady Lynesse who looked down at him in surprise.

“Lady Lynesse! My Lady! May I have your favour?” The ladies may have smiled and hid behind their fans, but he was triumphant in receiving Lady Lynesse’s rich white silk favour with delicate embroidery.

_Jorah defeated Lord Jason Mallister._

_Jorah defeated Lord Yohn Royce._

_Jorah defeated Ser Ryman Frey. He defeated another Frey named Hosteen._

_Lord Jorah Mormont defeated Lord Whent. Then, Lord Crakehall. Ser Boros Blount._

To everyone’s surprise and the Queen’s ire, he had defeated Ser Jaime Lannister who landed on his rump. Jorah could hear the cheers of the crowd. Lady Lynesse had a look of bafflement but she cheered for him wildly. He rode his horse to crown Lady Lynesse, the title of queen of love and beauty, when he noticed the Lady Lyanna seated next to the irate Queen with an amused smile at the fallen golden knight. Their eyes met and she smiled broadly at him. Jorah returned her smile and thought the Lady Lyanna reminded him of the north, of his beloved home of Bear Island. Wild, and resilient amongst the softness of the South. But Jorah had not come to Lannisport to crown a northern beauty, his queen. A dead prince had done so already. It was something his lord father and his lady aunt would want him to do.

_Honour our King’s and liege lord’s lady sister, they would tell him. A northerner like yourself._

Jorah was in love with a golden Maid like beauty. Jeor Mormont was now in the Night’s Watch, unable to voice his opinions on Jorah’s idea of the perfect bride or to pick out another suitable northern bride for his adult son. Jorah crowned Lady Lynesse Hightower, queen of love and beauty with a crown of golden roses from Highgarden. He had hoped for Lynesse to show up in his tent that evening and he would ask her lord father for her hand in marriage before the day was over. He turned his head at the sound of light footsteps enter his less than grand tent.

"Lady Lynesse?"

“Lady Lynesse is quite ill from drinking too much wine,” explained Lady Lyanna as she walked into his tent. _Prowled._

“I should go see if she-”

“Her septa is guarding her chamber,” cut Lyanna with some impatience.

“Oh,” he said disappointedly. If she weren’t a Stark, he might have believed Lyanna had a hand in getting Lynesse ill from drink. Jorah looked at Lyanna Stark with curiosity at her presence in his tent.

“I can’t run this time,” she whispered defeatedly. “I wish I could be happy to do my duty like so many other girls do. To marry whoever my lord father or my brothers dictate.” Jorah nodded remembering his lord father’s choice of Jorah’s late wife. “The realm bled because I thought Rhaegar gave me a choice, the freedom to choose my fate. I believed his lies and half-truths. My lord father died because I did not understand that he was no different than Lord Robert.” Jorah did not know what to say.

“Lord Rickard died by hand of a madman, my lady,” he spoke in what he hoped was a reassuring manner. She seemed to not have heard him. Her grey eyes were as faraway as the Silent Sea.

“Can you tell me about your home, Lord Mormont?” she asked as her grey eyes welled with tears. Jorah blinked in surprise and gestured for her to sit on his bed. It was a simple, harmless request. They sat on his bed next to each other. Jorah began to describe in detail of his logged smokey hall, his favourite parts of the island, the crofters, the forest of pine, and the various shades of blue of the sea. Lyanna laughed shakily,

“It sounds beautiful. I wish I could see for myself. I wish I could see Winterfell again.”

“Surely, your brother the King would not deny you a visit?” Jorah said with shock.

“I had to remain at court, to prove Rhaegar had not sullied my virtue,” she elucidated darkly. “That I wasn’t hiding a pregnancy. It won’t be the same once I am married to Lord Stannis. I will do my duty and marry him, but I want the north to have the last thing that I haven’t been forced to give up. Please take it from me.” His eyes widened at her second request. Beautiful and sad that she was, Jorah saw a glimmer of fierceness in her eyes that hadn’t been crushed. If he had been the knight he fancied himself to be, he would have freed her from her miserable caged tower somehow. Jorah Mormont was never meant to save Lyanna Stark.

“What if Lord Stannis learns you aren’t a-?”

“Horseback riding,” the former queen of love and beauty answered readily. “That’s what I will tell him.” She paused, “If you wish for me to go, I will go.” There was stubbornness in her jaw that dared him to refuse her. Her pale blue robe revealed a pale shoulder. He wanted Lady Lynesse, but it was Lord Rickard’s daughter whose face was mere inches from his. Asking, begging me to take her maidenhead. Perhaps, it was sympathy for the lady’s unhappy upcoming marriage and more pity for not taking her offered blue favour. He reasoned that he would follow his heart in morning, when Lynesse was no longer ill. Jorah leaned forward and kissed her. To Jorah’s surprise, kissing Lyanna was not a terrible thing. Not the religious experience he had expected of making love with Lynesse.

“You smell like pine,” she murmured. She removed her blue robe with maidenly shyness and discarded it on the floor.

“You are in a bear’s cave, my lady,” he stated as he took in the sight of her body in the candlelight.

“I am a wolf, remember,” Lyanna reminded him with grin as he took her in his arms. Lyanna came alive in his bed. He kissed her in places she naively did not know could be kissed. He hypocritically felt disloyal for enjoying her exploring hands touching his body, liking how her lips fit against his. Jorah felt he was doing her right by making the young woman come alive from the sad, dead shell of a girl that walked into his tent. He was just making a sad lady smile. Hadn’t he lived for smiles of approval his whole life? Her thankful, defiant smile at her blood on his sword reassured him. Jorah couldn’t refuse her desire to make love once more before she had to slip out of his tent, and his life.

“I’m sorry if I hurt you,” he apologized for everything. Her hand that had been too pale the previous day, stroked the side of his face as they lay facing each other.

“Oh Jorah Mormont, you are one of the few in this world who hasn’t hurt me. For that, I wish you a long, happy life in your hall of pine.”

* * *

Lyanna had married Stannis in the sept at Storm’s End not long after. Stannis had offered the godswood that his late brother had made for her. Lyanna had declined, to Stannis’ relief. She put away her sword and did her duties as lady of Storm’s End listlessly. Her eyes stared out to the sea, craving for the freedom it sang out to her. Her lack of moonsblood kept her from answering the song. Lyanna howled with happy hope at the thought of having a part of the North to sustain her here in the Storm’s Land. _A child of the North._

Her son came almost a moon early. Large and bald. Stannis was overjoyed in his own way at having a son and heir. Lyanna knew for certain that the babe was not the child of Stannis. Though he would never be none the wiser for the boy had inherited his lady mother’s looks until birds began to twitter. Stannis and Lyanna clashed over naming the boy so much that Ned mediated and suggested the name Jon, to which the Lord and Lady of Storm’s End agreed upon. In a rash decision, she had written to Jorah Mormont, an unsigned message, when Jon was near two years old. He had married Lady Lynesse Hightower the day after his victory at the tourney and he would likely have sons and daughters of his own soon.

* * *

_The boy is northern, through and through._

He read it over and over again, elated and bitter for years of being married twice had gone by without any legitimate born children to show for it. Jorah took a blind eye to Lynesse’s drinking of moon tea, thinking, hoping if she were happy enough she would want to bear his children. It was not loss to him, that his true wife drank moon tea and Lyanna Stark had let his seed take root after one night. During the extended stay at Winterfell, Jorah carefully queried about the Lord and Lady of Storm’s End in hopes of some news, information about the boy he had fathered. Benjen, still unmarried, divided his time between his three sibling’s castles had provided him information about Jon Baratheon.

“My sister’s son is tall, and strong for his age. He looks more Stark than Baratheon. Lyanna has birthed a girl named Shireen, who has the black hair and blue eyes of the Baratheons. Jon is quite clever with his knack for languages, but a bit of a grumpy bear. He sulks in the godswood, according to Lyanna.” Jorah almost paled at the words grumpy bear.

“I would be too, if I had Stannis for a father. Gods, the man just grinds his teeth all day,” jested Brandon. Benjen laughed and continued,

“Lyanna is eager to come for a visit during the harvest festival. She wants Jon to see Winterfell and the North.”

“What are the latest fashions from the capital?” interjected Lynesse, who was growing quite bored of the talk of children. Jorah leaned back in his chair. _Five moons from now._ Jorah wanted to see the boy just once. And Lyanna too, just to see if she was any happier than the last time he had seen her. His love and the gold he had poured into making Lynesse happy, drove him to run for his life to live in exile in Essos. Jorah never got to get a glimpse of the little boy and his lady mother. His pride prevented him from heeding his lord father’s wish for him to join the black. If he had he would have met the boy he had fathered a lot sooner. Jorah had Lynesse for a short while until she left him for a wealthy merchant prince. Jorah had realized Lynesse had been too young and naive to know what life she had married into at Bear Island.

* * *

 

He had eventually took the job of spying on the Targaryens in exchange for his pardon from Lord Arryn, the Hand of the King. _To go home._ He had been deep in thought as he walked behind the last Targaryens as Illyio Mopatis spoke, 

“Curious news I have received,” Mopatis began, “They say Cersei Lannister’s sons aren’t Eddard Stark’s. Another whisperer has also spoke of another cuckolded lord. The poor children, innocent of their mothers’ sins." Mopatis looked Mormont in the eye with a meaningful look,

"Your lord father is Lord Commander of the Night’s Watch?”

“Aye, he is,” answered Jorah with an impassive face at the news. How could they possibly know? There was supposedly nothing of Jorah Mormont in boy's appearance. "Why do you ask?"

"The king's sister, the Lady Lyanna has been charged with infidelity. A priestess from Asshai claims the heir of the Storm lord is not of Lord Stannis' seed." 

“The _bitch_  whore!" crowed Viserys with a cruel smile. Jorah glared at the young man. His mind was spinning about the boy and Lyanna's fates. How could this priestess have known for certain? He felt a cold dread course through his body. 

"Her bastard has escaped Lord Baratheon’s wrath with the help of the Night’s Watch and is now on the Wall.” The Wall was no safe place but the boy was with Jeor Mormont. May the boy prove to be less disappointing than the father. 

Viserys smiled with glee. “Oh, isn’t it a shame we shall miss the dogs be burned alive, sister?” Jorah looked away recalling his memory of the call of the banners when the North rose up at the murder of Rickard Stark by fire at the order of the Mad King.

“A terrible shame,” chirped Daenerys obediently. “They deserve their deaths.” Her passive agreement earned her a smile and a pat on her silver head from Viserys. 

"What of North?" he asked with thoughts of his younger cousins and his aunt. 

“Oh, Lord Brandon Stark has declared war and is in a race to save his brother in King’s Landing. His son, Rickon is barreling his way to the Stormlands to rescue Lady Lyanna from the fires of Rh'ollar.” Viserys laughed cruelly. Jorah shivered though he wore layers of wool and armour in the absurd heat as the faded memory of her face came unwillingly. Jorah could not think of  his- her- _their_ folly in front of Viserys or Illyrio.

Daenerys looked up at him with kind concern.

“Are you well, ser?”

Jorah confused Princess Daenerys' face and fair hair with Lynesse. He blinked and swallowed with the fleeting thought if he had accepted Lady Lyanna's favour at the tourney. If he had married her instead and risked the punishment for wedding Lyanna without Ned or Brandon's permission. This boy Jon would have been truly his true son, carrying the Mormont name. He would have had the pride of his lord father knowing the male line would not end with Jorah. It was naught to be, there had been no spark of love at first sight between the Mormont knight and Stark maiden. _Love was important._ Lynesse had been worth the trouble and shame he went through. He had not regretted selling those poachers. Lynesse's love for him had been sweet if not enduring. He was not a man of regrets, but if there was one regret, he might have admitted that not saving Lyanna Stark haunted him. 

“I am, princess,” he lied. 

 _The boy was safe with Father. As safe as one could be at the Wall,_ he thought grimly.

 But would Old Jeor see the boy as another one of Jorah’s shameful acts to their noble house if he knew?

* * *

Queen Daenerys sat atop the throne of Dragonstone and waved for what appeared to be two brothers of Night’s Watch to come forward. Jorah stood at her side as he had for many years. His eyes widened at recognition of the dark haired young man. Jorah couldn’t look at the young man who was no longer a boy in the eye and not see the mournful Lyanna Stark. He instead looked at the fat, sandy haired man and the large direwolf who stood in-between the two black brothers. The beast was as large as a full-grown bear and the beast unsettlingly stared at Jorah. Its sheer size unsettled everyone in the large hall. Even Dany looked at it warily. 

"I thought the beast would be chained outside," she hissed to Tyrion and Jorah as Missendai listed all of Dany's titles to their guests. Jorah watched a whispered exchange between the men. 

“I’m Jon Snow, formerly Jon Baratheon. I am the former Lord Commander of the Night’s Watch. I have come to request your help, on behalf of the _independent_ North. The armies of the Others, by the thousands are marching south. My men are disappearing, good men." He swallowed and spoke in lower tone, "Even my uncle has been missing for years, but I know he is not dead." Jorah could feel Dany bristle at lack of deference and her scepticism. Jon seemed to be realized he gone on a tangent, "We are in dire need of your dragons in this war against the Dead.”

Jorah could not help but to see the long faces of Brandon and Ned Stark's in Jon Snow's. The long face of Lyanna. Yet he could hear _his_ voice, a voice he had yearned to hear again even if only to chastise Jorah. Jorah heard his lord father’s booming voice in the young Jon’s. 

"An army of the  _Others_?" scoffed Daenerys. "I thought this was a meeting with an emissary for the North to bend the knee to me." Jorah blindly ignored the imperious tone which would not fare with the proud Northerners, especially the Starks. Jon in turn frowned coldly,

“I saw the Others with my own eyes, I fought them." Still he did not address as Her Grace.

“No one can survive for years alone up there, boy,” disagreed Ser Selmy practically.

"I knew when my Uncle Brandon was slain in battle. I knew when my uncle King Eddard was murdered." Jon had a tortured look on his face, "I _saw_ \- I knew my lady mother was no more." Everyone looked at him as if he were half-mad. "I know it sounds mad." Jon looked Jorah in the eye. "Your lord father believed me. He knew of the threat the Others pose.” Jorah frowned as he returned the gaze. He could see Longclaw on the young man’s hip. Gone was the bear, replaced with the direwolf. Jorah suddenly could not find his words. 

“Aye, Lord Mormont was a good man. He knew his men well,” spoke Tyrion glancing over at Jorah. Tyrion had been in Westeros long enough to hear the whispers and the accusations. 

"I will not offer aid to those who do not bend the knee, especially not House Stark. Your uncle stole my family's throne," snarled Dany with a frown.

"After your brother took my mother south and your mad father burnt my grandfather instead of giving him a proper trial by combat," retorted Jon evenly. "The Starks and the North shall never again pledge fealty to a southron and especially to a foreign invader." 

"I was born in here and I have come to take back what is mine," snapped Dany angrily. "I have a war to win against Cersei Lannister. In any case, I am not my father and I should not be held responsible for my father's doings." 

Jon sighed with frustration,

"I beg you. I implore you to see the bigger picture. The dead are coming for us all and it won't matter who sits where or who has more rights if we are dead. We need to fight the Others together. Winter is here.” 

“Then tell your cousins to bend the knee and stop declaring themselves, the King and Queen of the North. I will not negotiate with traitors," insisted Dany. 

“They want assurances of Sansa’s safety and to have brought home to the North-” Tyrion shifted uncomfortably at the mention of his niece. 

“Your half-sister Lady Shireen,” interrupted Queen Daenerys coldly. Jon's face darkened at the mention of Shireen Baratheon. 

“Is still my little sister and is innocent. As is my cousin, Sansa Stark who is locked up here alone.” The tall, blonde princess had Ned Stark’s grey eyes and his trusting nature. Tyrion's insistence that Sansa was indeed Ned's little girl had been her saving grace from Drogon’s dragon fire, when Dany had conquered Dragonstone. 

_A valuable hostage in Daenery's war against Princess Sansa's mother Cersei Lannister and her armies in King's Landing and now the North._

Tyrion had informed Jorah that Jon had once been promised to wed his fair haired Stark cousin before everything went to ashes. Jon's fury and pain at his cousin's imprisonment was plain to see.

_He too, had fallen in love with a maiden of fair hair._

Dany continued to ignore the mention of Sansa Stark, “The Stormlands proclaimed Shireen as the rightful Queen through her small amount of Targaryen blood and thus deny my birthright to rule the Seven Kingdoms." 

"Let me see Sansa," pled Jon desperately looking to Tyrion. "I need to know she is alright." Tyrion opened his mouth but Dany spoke firmly,

"I will continue to hold Sansa hostage until the war is over and my throne is won.”

Jon laughed harshly, "You mentioned that you should not be held responsible for your father's crimes yet you punish Sansa Stark for her mother's. Breaker of Chains, you say?" Jon looked to Missendai, to Jorah, and Tyrion. 

"Am I to be your hostage as well?” snorted Jon at them. Jorah glanced at Daenerys and noticed her nostrils flared with indignation but she said nothing _yet_.

“Sansa is your niece, Lannister!” Jorah willed for the boy to shut his mouth, before Tyrion’s careful arguments to free the poor girl was undone and before he too was held hostage. 

 _Tyrion will free Ned Stark's girl, you fool._ Tyrion Lannister had not confided with Jorah but Jorah had noted that the Lannister was up to something, likely devising a plan for the girl to escape Dragonstone and go to her mother or North. 

 _Or to Jon's arms._  

Tyrion spoke carefully, “Of course, I am aware Sansa is my niece-”

“Jon- we came to ask for help,” nudged Samwell sagely. Jorah exhaled hoping this would quiet Jon from getting himself chained in the cell that once was Sansa Stark's until Tyrion had convinced Dany to keep her in isolated chambers. Jorah glanced at the young beautiful woman he had pledged his service and by her severe look he knew he could not help Jon if he got himself chained and shackled. Dany and Jon were locked in a staring-glaring match and the dislike was palpable. 

“Oh excuse me, Your Grace- I almost forgot. I have been carrying a message to, um, Ser Jorah Mormont, your lord father-he f-forgave you. His dying wish was for you to know of his forgiveness. A-nd to join the Night’s Watch." The long face of Jon grew sombre at the mention of the Old Bear's death. 

"Lord Mormont was a good man. A great lord commander," added Jon gruffly gripping the pommel of Longclaw as he spoke. 

"Lord Mormont also said, _”He needs you to help him in this war_ ,“ stammered Samwell Tarly. Jorah looked pained from the memory when he had learned from Tyrion of the mutiny that led Jeor Mormont’s murder. He was flooded with memories of his lord father. Of his home at Bear Island with his fierce cousins, Dacey and Alysane and the younger girls. The youngest of Maege's likely had little to no remembrance of him. It hurt to think of tall, brave Dacey murdered so young when the Boltons betrayed the Starks. He could remember her toothy smile and his aunt's loud laughter at them playing.

The boy who stood before them, had been nearly been killed in a mutiny against him as well. Proud and defiant like the mother, with the same determined look. 

_Father knew about Jon in the end._

"Who is _he_ , my bear?” queried the queen glancing at Jorah with curiosity in her purple eyes. 

“My son,” Jorah answered staring at tall, burly, young man with hair too dark, too pale of skin, and a brooding glower that matched his own. 

"Bastard son," corrected Jon with a neutral tone though he took two steps towards Jorah. The direwolf followed with curious eyes. 

"He is your son?" gaped Dany with surprise and shock. Jorah failed to notice a flash of anger in her eyes at what she saw a betrayal, an omission of fact. Jorah had never spoken of his bastard son with ties with both the Starks and Shireen Baratheon. Cersei Lannister had been Jon's aunt until Ned Stark was murdered before their daughter Sansa's eyes. Jorah walked down from his place next to his queen to stand a few feet from his son. 

“Ah, so that is where Jon gets his charming personality from,” laughed Tyrion with amusement. "I mean he is sombre as Ned Stark was but even Ned was more amiable. Jon is certainly more pretty than you though-" He laughed even more as both father and son turned to growl at him,

“Do you ever shut up?”


End file.
